Open source intranets

By Toby Ward — Open source platforms continue to advance and evolve and they’re starting to appear more often as solutions for enterprise intranets.

According to WhatIs.com, “Open source refers to any program whose
source code is made available for use or modification as users or
other developers see fit. (Historically, the makers of proprietary
software have generally not made source code available.) Open source
software is usually developed as a public collaboration and made freely
available.”

One of the leader’s in the open source intranet space is Plone – a collaborative content
management system that is regarded as one of the better open source
enterprise intranet platforms. Plone features enterprise content
management with workflow, role-based content, a search engine and even
a wiki (see www.WikiPedia.com
for an example of a collaborative wiki).

Non-techies can use Plone without knowing a stitch of HTML. The
system includes templates for news, events, documents, and photos. An
additional 200+ templates and tools are also available for download.
The visual editor is Kupu which
bears comparison to a light version of Microsoft Word.

Plone is actually based on Zope, a Python-based application
server, and CMF, a
content management applications platform. Plone sits on top of Zope via
a user-friendly interface. In all, some 100 developers support and work
on the platform.

The New Zealand State Services Commission is championing an Plone
as the primary content management solution for state agencies. In fact,
New Zealand has already used Plone to develop www.e.govt.nz, as well
as the website for the Ministry of Women's Affairs.

Toby Ward, a former journalist and a regular e-business
columnist and speaker, is the President and Founder of Prescient Digital Media. For more information on
Prescient’s CMS Blueprint service, or for a free copy of the white
paper “Finding ROI”,
please contact us.